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Partnership with Parents

Partnerships with parents You can be left in little doubt that it is generally considered to be a ‘good thing’ for parents and carers to be intimately involved with the schools and settings which care for and educate their children. Birth to Three Matters, the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage and the Foundation Stage Profile: Handbook all remind us of this. Parents, we all know and appreciate, are children’s first educators. Current UK government thinking places parents high on the agenda, talking about ways of helping parents (particularly mothers) go back to work or study and offering them that ‘golden’ word: choice. Indeed, in December 2004 the government published a policy document called Choice for Parents: The Best Start for Children and described the policy as a tenyear strategy for childcare. The goals of the policy are laudable: more money, more training, more inter-agency work. The policy arises out of the research mentioned in an earlier chapter (Daycare Trust 2004) and the Effective Provision of Pre-School Education (EPPE) Project. Here are some of the things being proposed:

• The setting up of children’s centres where the youngest children are brought together in one setting so that there is care and education for babies, toddlers and pre-schoolers.

• The leaders of these children’s centres to be offered training through a one-year programme focusing on leadership (currently being trialled).

• By 2008 there are supposed to be children’s centres serving 2,500 communities.

• The setting up of childminding networks to link childminders caring for children in homes rather than settings to be linked into the system.

• The setting up of extended day programmes for schools, allowing parents to be offered care for their children beyond the hours of the traditional school day. • Funding for childcare through working tax credits which is aimed to go beyond the current figure of £135 per week for a single child and £300 for two children in a family.

• Joined-up services for families.

• A proper qualifications strategy for childcare workers.

• Attention paid to parental leave and to flexible working. It is up to you to decide whether this approach takes seriously raising the status of childcare as a profession, of childcare workers within society, of children within our culture. Sceptics might suggest that the policy has more to do with getting parents back to work to boost the economy than about offering universal, free quality care and education to all children whose parents want it. In terms of parental participation there is a wealth of documented evidence showing that where parents and practitioners work closely together, children thrive. It is imperative that in any setting a genuine two-way partnership is established. This means

Partnerships with parents You can be left in little doubt that it is generally considered to be a ‘good thing’ for parents and carers to be intimately involved with the schools and settings which care for and educate their children. Birth to Three Matters, the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage and the Foundation Stage Profile: Handbook all remind us of this. Parents, we all know and appreciate, are children’s first educators. Current UK government thinking places parents high on the agenda, talking about ways of helping parents (particularly mothers) go back to work or study and offering them that ‘golden’ word: choice. Indeed, in December 2004 the government published a policy document called Choice for Parents: The Best Start for Children and described the policy as a tenyear strategy for childcare. The goals of the policy are laudable: more money, more training, more inter-agency work. The policy arises out of the research mentioned in an earlier chapter (Daycare Trust 2004) and the Effective Provision of Pre-School Education (EPPE) Project. Here are some of the things being proposed:

• The setting up of children’s centres where the youngest children are brought together in one setting so that there is care and education for babies, toddlers and pre-schoolers.

• The leaders of these children’s centres to be offered training through a one-year programme focusing on leadership (currently being trialled).

• By 2008 there are supposed to be children’s centres serving 2,500 communities.

• The setting up of childminding networks to link childminders caring for children in homes rather than settings to be linked into the system.

• The setting up of extended day programmes for schools, allowing parents to be offered care for their children beyond the hours of the traditional school day.

• Funding for childcare through working tax credits which is aimed to go beyond the current figure of £135 per week for a single child and £300 for two children in a family.

• Attention paid to parental leave and to flexible working. It is up to you to decide whether this approach takes seriously raising the status of childcare as a profession, of childcare workers within society, of children within our culture. Sceptics might suggest that the policy has more to do with getting parents back to work to boost the economy than about offering universal, free quality care and education to all children whose parents want it. In terms of parental participation there is a wealth of documented evidence showing that where parents and practitioners work closely together, children thrive. It is imperative that in any setting a genuine two-way partnership is established. This means